Ranking This Years Coaching Carousel

#10 Texas AM: You fire your head coach after beating your rival because he had a secret insider news letter that made him $30K a year. The buy out of his contract cost you millions. You hire Mike Sherman an NFL retread the next day. Not much of a search for a good football program. Too quick of a pick on a guy that wasn't on any one's top 10 list. Should have considered Brian Kelly.



#9 Washington State: Hired Paul Wulff from Eastern Washington. Who? I guess Paul was the Big Sky Coach of the year three times. If your the Big Sky anything you shouldn't be coaching in the Pac 10. Yikes!



#8 West Virgina: You have the highest ranked team looking for a head coach. Your playing in a BCS Bowl and just blew out one of the best coaches/programs in the country. You interview some top assistants at other schools including Jimbo Fisher from Florida State. You stay away from anyone with the last name Bowden (great move) and hire the interim coach Bill Stewart who has won two games in his life as a head coach. Boosters are mad, Bill Stewart is very happy and making less then a Million a year. Risky hire for a top 10 team in the country. The rumor mill has it that one of WVU' coaching head coaching canidates Doc Holliday from Florida may join the WVU staff as the assistant head coach for $2.5m for 5 years. Sounds like a lot of indians without a chief.



#7 Arkansas: Houston Nutt quits and you start your search. You look at just about everyone in the country. Rich Rodriguez turns you down, you get a couple of SEC coaches/friends some raises and then you pull out a 1st year NFL coach after a Monday Night Game that his team played in. Bobby Petrino would have been a good hire if you had done it after the season, doing it after the Monday Night Game will live with you forever. Terrible logistics, Risky Hire for a guy that lost of ton of credibility. Bobby is a job hopper that is willing to leave his team at anytime. Good Luck recruiting and nice job in the bowl game.



#6 Ole Miss: Houston Nutt quits at 9:00pm and is introduced at Ole Miss at 11:00pm . Wow that is some quick negotiations. Houston has always been well respected as a coach and a good hire for Ole Miss which program hasn't exactly been lighting it on fire lately. But nobody wins at Ole Miss.



#5 Georgia Tech: Chan Gailey had out lived his welcome with the supporters of GT. I know this for a fact because I can't go to a certain friends house during a Tech game because I'm bad luck. Maybe I will get a free pass or a new start when the Paul Johnson era begins. I hope so because he has the best draft beer around! Paul is a good coach who turned Navy around. I expect he will have to tweak his triple option offense for the ACC. Good Hire.



#4 Nebraska: After this years debacle you wondered who is going to turn around that program. So they went to the National Champions LSU Tigers and brought home a Cornhuscker in Bo Pelini. I know for a fact that Bo's from Ohio make legendary coaches. A very good hire for a program that needs to get back to their roots and back to the Black Shirts way of defense.



#3 UCLA: I have been swayed by the media on this hire. I really don't believe UCLA wanted Rick Neuheisel when this process began. I always felt Rick would get another shot at a head coaching job in college but I thought it would be at a desperate program looking for a turn around. This is a very high profile job and the day Rick gets hired his former boss and staff gets fired from the Ravens. That has to sour this hire a bit since he would have gotten fired if they waited a day or two to hire him at UCLA. Rick will have to run the cleanest program in the NCAA. I've heard nothing but positives from everyone on this hire, I guess only time will tell.



#2 SMU: SMU fired their coach sometime in 1987 I think. Just kidding, they had the first opening this year and it took them nearly 10 weeks to find a coach. What better coach to get then one that just masterminded a turn around for program was 0-11 when he took over to one that just completed a 12-1 season and berth in a BCS Bowl? You know it's a good hire when the AD from the school you took him from gets fired on the day you hire their coach. June Jones will bring some points to the once proud SMU program.



#1 Michigan: Big shocker here right? Let's see this is a Michigan Football Blog and Michigan just ends up getting ranked as the best hire this year. Ok, I hear ya but let me just give you some points and see if you agree with me in the end. First off, Michigan hasn't gone outside the program for a new coach for 40 years, the only Michigan man deserving the job was going to play Michigan's top rival in the National Championship game and the courting of him ended up to be a media disaster. So now what? You have to go back on what your needs are in a new coach/program: A young coach that would be able to bring new thought leadership to the offense and to be able to stay for 10-20 years. He would have to have head coaching experience and be a big name to make a splash with fans, alumni, and recruits. Rich has turned down programs like Alabama, Arkansas, and probably many others. The one program he choose to go to was Michigan. Best hire of the year!